Michelle Williams on falling asleep at dinner parties and the fellow actress who changed her life

In a world where celebrities constantly travel the globe, run businesses alongside their entertainment careers and are active on social media 24/7, it's easy to think they're super-humans.

But Michelle Williams has come out and admitted she often feels so tired juggling her acting career and raising her nine-year-old daughter, Matilda Rose, with the late Heath Ledger, that she falls asleep at dinner parties.

In an interview with Elle UK, the American actress said, "I feel like I’m so good at raising a kid when I’m not working. I don’t forget anything. I’ve got everything covered. It’s a real luxury to have a moment when I’m not scrambling."

"I feel like most of my life, I’m trying to do two things at once, both to the best of my abilities...So that leaves me feeling pretty exhausted."

Williams, 34, says she has a reputation among her friends for being tired. "I’m the person who falls asleep all the time. You invite me over for dinner or to a party, and there’s a whole scrapbook of pictures of me napping. I’ve even been given a nickname because of my snoring."

Michelle Williams with Heath Ledger at the Oscars 2006

The star has come a long way from Dawson's Creek having been nominated for an Oscar three times: for portraying Marilyn Monroe in My Week with Marilyn, for her leading role in Blue Valentine and for her supporting role in Brokeback Mountain, where she met Heath Ledger on set.

The couple were together for three years and split months before Ledger died from an accidental overdose of prescription medication in 2008 his apartment in New York.

In 2012, Williams spoke of how she was hounded by the tabloid press at the time: "I just felt trapped. And it's not just me - there's somebody else who I'm trying to protect, and I can't. I can't make it stop, I can't make it go away," referring to her young daughter.

But Williams says she has one Hollywood star to thank for her increased privacy over the years.

She credits actress Kristen Bell, 34, for pioneering the No Kids Policy, where A-listers from Jennifer Aniston to Jennifer Lawrence agreed to decline interviews with TV and print outlets that use paparazzi photos or videos of children without their parents' consent. Bell then met with entertainment media executives and asked them to comply with the policy or else celebrities will stay away

"Men and women in suits were cashing checks off of my daughter’s face," said Williams. "There are so many problems with that. But Kristen has made it so much easier for these kids to live in a world that is friendly and that they can trust.”

"Every month I send her a gushy ‘You don’t know what you’ve done’ note. Now my daughter and other kids aren’t scared to walk down the street anymore. It’s like a miracle," she says.

'No Kids Policy' pioneer and actress Kristen Bell

Williams says she has little time for social media and the first thing she does when she wakes up in the morning - instead of turning to social media, like we might - is read poetry.

"I love poetry because it’s like a shot, like an attack, like a dose. And for a person who doesn’t have very much free time, it does its work very quickly. So I read poems on my phone when I wake up in the morning."

"It opens you up for the rest of the day, and suddenly your life becomes a little more observed. And when it becomes more observed, it can’t help but start to become more beautiful."